


dulce et decorum est

by magesamell



Series: funeral bell [1]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst and More Angst, F/M, Identity Issues, Second Person, also like...all the inquisition spoilers, solas absolutely not helping at all w any of this, the sad sad tale of iova lavellan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-03
Updated: 2014-12-03
Packaged: 2018-02-28 00:01:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2711549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magesamell/pseuds/magesamell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>you let him leave you because he says it is right and proper. you let him leave because he said the sweetest things, and you believe him. you let him leave but not without a shining and awake moment of anger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dulce et decorum est

**Author's Note:**

> so i finished the main story of inquisition uh...today. and man, lavellan has the saddest life.

the keeper wants you away, and even though you do not want to -- you go, because you respect your elders and you are just first and not yet keeper and if the keeper says this conclave is important for the clan, you believe her. you go, spy, and cover your ears with a hooded cloak you bought from the closest shemlen village

interloper, you save the divine, or the divine saves you -- and you are marked and falling, falling --

interloper, they call you, despising you. a dalish elf, touched by andraste? _no,_ you want to say. you, ignoramus among the faithful, do not believe in andraste, you desire neither such praise or censure -- but you receive it anyway. you require the protection the herald gives you. and so you accept it.

herald, they call you. you smile and accept it.

you accept the mark, too. it burns your blood and your palm blisters and crackles every time you cast and the fade is ripping through you, shredding you, owning you -- you accept it.

inquisitor, they call you, and where there should be pride there sits a cold, clutching doom between your shoulders. amazing, that they would grant an elf such power. but you feel less and less like an elf every day. the keeper accuses the inquisition of kidnapping and privately -- privately --

publicly, you reassure her. publicly, you ask the nobles for aid and protection of the clan. publicly, you read the letter detailing their deaths. for the first time in your life you bear grief alone. in a fortress full of people, of others, of friends, you find no ally. no one cares for this sharp, elvhen grief -- for you are not lavellan, and you are not of the elvhen. the inquisitor has consumed every part of lavellan. the inquisitor is simply too big to also be lavellan

and so cassandra scorns you for not believing in the maker.

and so you promise sera to not be too elfy

and so solas furrows his brow when you protest -- softly -- smally, when you remind him you are dalish. and in return he reveals another mistake, rebukes every foolish thing you believe

and so you laugh a little when harding says it’s very sad -- what happened to the elves.

and so you accept it, the slow embalming process. the fade burns you inside and out, and it perhaps it is right, but mostly it is lonely, mostly it is bitter, mostly it is sickening and foul but never so much that you will **show** it

(you love solas, but only in the small way you love things -- it is meek love and unassuming love and he is always a half-step out of your reach, a half-step too distant from intimacy, from confidance, from partnership. he is too wise for you, and your hold is weak, you are sleeping, and dreaming, and fading, and already losing--)

and so you offer up more and more to the altar to be sacrificed, to be destroyed, you drink the bitter water from the well and allow mythal to consume you, for you are meant to be consumed, little withering lavellan

you let him remove the vallaslin because he says the keeper was wrong and you believe him.

(you believe him.)

you let him leave you because he says it is right and proper. you let him leave because he said the sweetest things, and you believe him. you let him leave but not without a shining and **awake** moment of anger.

( **you take the vallaslin from my face and now you just end it? you take my gods, my clan, my life, my** \-- enough. we don’t always get what we want)

and so the inquisitor slays the dragon, slays the demon, slays the darkspawn. the inquisitor closes the breach and the inquisitor all but in name appoints the divine and the inquisition brings stability to two countries and the inquisition stands proud and victorious.

you sleep alone and wonder if you are real. if lavellan still lives, somewhere, away.

you think you might know where, but he is lost and fading

my _heart_ , he called you, and you believe him.

what we had was real, he said, and you believe that less.


End file.
